Global Warming Fact Finder

     I’m not sure what to think of this one. It sounds a little wacko – but on the other hand – what if it works? I just hope the government doesn’t think it’s a good idea and want to spend our money on it.

     According to one scientist from Maryland, we could conceivably regulate the temperature of the earth by spraying water into the air. Ron Ace says, “Spray giga tons of seawater into the air, mainly in the Northern Hemisphere, and let Mother Nature do the rest.” He goes on, “The evaporating water would cool the Earth in multiple ways: First, the sprayed droplets would transform into water vapor, a change that absorbs thermal energy near ground level; then the rising vapor would condense into sunlight-reflecting clouds and cooling rain, releasing much of the stored energy into space in the form of infrared radiation.”

     My question is who is going to pay for this? He says we need to spray “giga tons” of water into the atmosphere. The infrastructure to accomplish this would have to be enormous.

     Further, as we have noted before, water vapor contributes to global warming. In our article ”Rising Temperature Causes CO2 to Rise” we pointed out that water vapor composes the largest component of Greenhouse Gases at 96.9% of all of the Greenhouse gases. Other gases are miniscule by comparison.

     Water vapor in the atmosphere is the dominant green house gas effecting temperature on earth. This is most evident when you compare the night to day temperature changes in arid climates to humid climates. The night to day change of temperature in the dry, arid desert can vary as much as 40-50 degrees from night to day. However, the temperatures in humid locations will only vary 15-20 degrees from night to day. It can be further evidenced when you compare the drop in overnight temperature in an average climate area when it is cloudy versus when it is clear. Temperatures will drop to only 65 degrees when it is cloudy but will drop to 40 or 50 degrees when it is clear. Water vapor retains heat.

     At any one time water vapor accounts for 36 to 70 percent of the total greenhouse gas effects. If clouds are included, it jumps to 66 to 86 percent. Carbon Dioxide comes in a distant third for only 9 to 17 percent of the total greenhouse effect. And remember, man’s activities account for less than 3% of all of the carbon dioxide produced, so at the most, man is responsible for less than 1 percent of all of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

     Therefore, I question whether pumping huge amounts of water vapor into the atmosphere is going to help or hinder the supposed Global Warming theory? What if it actually contributes to the warming of the planet? I do recognize that clouds to reflect the sun’s rays away from the earth. But they also trap heat close to the ground. So what would the effect be? Who knows? I just know I don’t want to pay for it through more taxes.

If you wish to read more on this click here. Also, don’t forget to check out the website at Global Warming Fact Finder.com

T. Boone Pickens Abandons His Plan for the Largest Wind Farm

     You may remember the commercials during the 2008 Presidential Campaign that featured Mr. T. Boone Pickens touting his plan to wean us off our dependency of foreign oil. His plan included developing natural gas resources and building more wind mill farms to generate electrical energy in lieu of more coal burning generation plants. One of the largest parts of his plan included building the worlds’ largest wind farms in the heart of Texas capable of generating as much as 1,000 megawatts of electricity. That is comparable to one nuclear energy generating plant.

     Well right from the beginning, there were snags. Financing was not as easy to come by as originally thought. With the current price on natural gas and electricity plunging, the numbers don’t seem to work as well. Plus, as it turns out, you need transmission lines near the wind mills to connect the electricity to the grid, and neither Pickens nor the State has been willing to step up and build those transmission lines. Transmission lines are expensive. According to Pickens, “It was a little more complicated than we thought.”

     While wind driven generators look like a logical alternative to fossil fuels, there are significant costs and tradeoffs that must be considered. For one thing, wind generators don’t necessarily blend into the landscape. They are actually a visual blight that detracts from the view of the land upon which they sit. How willing are people to have wind farms interrupting their view of the Sierras, Rockies, Great Plains or desserts (oh wait, we already have the latter). There was a time when power poles and lines were considered visual pollution. Where are environmentalists’ cries about the visual pollution? They are very vocal about the view of drilling platforms in the ocean, where they don’t even live.

     Wind farms require a great deal more land to produce the same amount of energy as a conventional generation plant. They pose a deadly risk to birds and bats in the area. The spinning blades can and do knock them out of the air.

     And when it comes to making money from the electricity generated, power companies don’t just automatically write you a check for the power you dump into the system. Prior agreement is required, and if the power is not needed they don’t pay for it. They have their own generation sources that they need to pay for first.

     T. Boone Pickens, an oil made multi-billionaire, is recommending that we wean ourselves off of the use of foreign oil - a lofty ideal for sure. But do not think for a minute that if he didn’t think he could make some serious money off of the alternatives, he would still be singing that song. But at least for now, faced with the realization of the costs involved in building wind farms, he is backing off that idea. His original idea to build the world’s largest wind farm, starting with a 1000 megawatt wind farm and expanding that to 4000 megawatts is being scaled way back. He is instead going to build 4 or 5 smaller projects.

     But you have to give him credit. At least he is doing something. Whereas, your normal environmentalist, global warming alarmist offers little more than lip service to their perceived problem – not that Pickens is necessarily one of these. Most environmental alarmists have never had to work at a serious job that requires their effort to produce a marketable product at any time in their lives. They have no idea of the lives they affect or livelihoods they destroy. Pickens though, has worked all of his life, and knows what it takes to do something productive. In spite of the problems before him, he will most likely find a way to succeed at his plan. We can only hope we will all be a little better off for his efforts.

By:  Greg Henss

As we have predicted, it is a slippery slope we are on when we allow activists to garner credibility with their doom and gloom predictions of global calamity.  When it is repeated long enough and loud enough, eventually others will begin to believe it, no matter how outlandish the claim.  And not long after that we will see laws and legislation that will cost us dearly to try and counteract the calamity.  This is what happens when people like Al Gore, touting ‘junk science’ are given encouragement.  And so it begins. 

With the election of a liberal president, and control of both the house and senate in the hands of the liberal democrats, there is little the conservative side of reason can do now to stop a ridiculous bill from being ram-roaded into law.  The American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act just recently passed through the house.   This bill with more than 1500 pages has no less than 397 new government regulations, 1090 new economic mandates.  It sailed through with relatively little debate as debate was severely squelched by the Speaker Of The House, the lovely Nancy Pelosi.  All of the Republican suggested amendments were thrown out, save one.  And Representatives were given all of nine hours to read through the 1500 pages, ensuring that no one has a handle on everything that is in this huge bill. 

And if you think it won’t affect you, think again.  Also known as the ‘cap and trade’ bill, the ACES act will place taxes on electric generation, oil refineries and natural gas producers.  All of those new costs will be passed on to you, the consumer.  And according to those who have studied bill, the cap and trade taxes will be expensive and kill millions of jobs.  

By Greg Henss

How many of you remember the Global Cooling predictions of the 1970’s.  Scientists and climatologists, who started looking at average temperature declines over the past three decades, were actually predicting the possibility that we could be heading into a mini ice age.   Back then, just as now, they were afraid that politicians would not take them seriously enough to do anything about it.  Predictions of serious declines in food production, lack of rain, shifts in population centers, and the outbreak of devastating tornadoes, had pundits decrying the coming changes would change life as we know it, unless the government did something to try and stop it from coming.^[1]   And the government actually did try and do something about it. 

If you can believe this, the government actually sent bombers north, up to the polar ice cap region and cast soot out over the ice in an attempt to increase the amount of solar radiation the ice absorbed and thereby melt the ice.   Well of course, that didn’t work.  They also suddenly became concerned about what consequences it may have if it did work.  How might they have created problems far worse than those they solve?   What’s more, it wasn’t long after that the temperatures started cycling upward - naturally.  It is only recently that the average earth temperature has recovered to pre 1941 levels.  

And what is happening now?  The temperature averages are again showing signs of cycling downward.  Climate change has reversed - again.  Glaciers are growing^[2].  Polar ice is thicker than previous years, and growing seasons are again getting shorter.  This year, in June 2009, the average daily temperature is still not above freezing, marking the first time in fifty years of record keeping that has happened.^[3]

Does any of this sound familiar?  Wake up America.  Climate and global temperatures are cyclical.  And it is arrogant to believe that man could possibly have any control over it, either negatively or positively, in either direction.  In spite of evidence that shows the earth is cooling again, alarmists are still trying to convince us that we are heating up the planet by driving our cars and turning on an electric light bulb.  If politicians actually start passing legislation and taxation aimed at Global Warming, not only will they be wasting our money, but they could conceivably break our economy chasing a fix that will never work. 

But wait, they already have.  Just days ago, the United States House of Representatives led by the lovely Nancy Pelosi, passed, (or should I say ram rodded) a bill through that contains no less than 397 new government regulations and restrictions, and 1090 new economic mandates, in an effort to save us from ourselves and stop “Global Warming”.   This bill, the American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act containing more than 1500 pages was narrowly passed 219 to 212, and I guarantee you that not one congressman has read the entire bill let alone understands it, especially since it was handed to them only nine hours before the vote. 

Ordinarily, voting for a huge tax on energy in the middle of a deep economic recession would be tantamount to political suicide.  But that didn’t seem to bother most of Speaker Pelosi’s Democratic flock of obedient sheep.   Although there were 44 of her flock who decided to vote their own mind and voted against it.   There probably would have been many more NO votes had the supreme leader Pelosi allowed debate on the bill to run its normal course.  But democrat leaders allowed only 3 hours of debate after which Rep. Henry Waxman (co-author) actually complained when it ran over that.   

By:  Greg Henss

Yet another liberal claim is being blown up as propaganda. Man is not responsible for Global Warming after all. As it turns out, the natural rise in earth temperature is what is causing the rise in CO2 levels in the atmosphere. It is not the other way around the way the doom and gloom liberal alarmists would have you believe.

If you were to watch the Al Gore farce of a movie “An Inconvenient Truth” you might walk away with the idea that we as humans on earth, living in the glow of the great technological luxuries that the creativity of man has provided, are causing Global Warming as a whole. Scientists are now looking at the information becoming available, that carbon dioxide, which it has been claimed is the big culprit, is indeed increasing. But the data is showing … read more …>

By: Greg Henss

The Ski Area at Snowmass, Colorado, has decided that it wants to do its part and try to go “Green”, and reduce Global Warming by installing wind turbines on top of the mountain to generate electricity for the Ski area operations. But as it turns out, it may have an ‘unintended consequence’ as they may be a hazard for bats.

Wind generator turbines are required to have identifying lights on them for aircraft to see at night, when the turbines get up above a certain height. Being that the turbines will be on top of the mountain, and are 200 feet tall, these qualify for navigation lighting. That now makes it a problem for the bats in the area since the lights will likely attract insects which will in turn attract bats. With a concentration of insects, there is likely to be a concentration of bats which could then be ‘batted’ out of the sky by the spinning blades of the turbine.

The Aspen Skiing Company and the Forest Service are considering placing three tall wind turbines atop the ski mountain in a effort to generate electricity and reduce the “carbon footprint” of the ski area operation. Aspen Skiing Company figures that by placing three turbines into their system they can reduce their electrical draw by two-thirds. But in so doing, the blades of the three turbines may become deadly for the bats if navigation lights are required on the turbines.

The Forest Service first became aware of the potential problem during a preliminary study of the potential environmental and visual effects that the towers may create. Such impacts will need to be more fully investigated and studied before the project can move forward. Results of the environmental impact reports will also need to be reviewed by the federal government.

Another hurdle that must be overcome is wind speeds will need to be studied to determine the viability of using wind turbines. In an effort to conduct that study, the Forest Service and Ski Company have decided to place a temporary wind turbine tower to test the wind speed, since a temporary tower does not need approvals and studies because of its ‘temporary’ nature. However, during their effort to hoist the tower into place, the tower fell to the ground as it was being winched up, damaging the tower. They hope to have the tower in place in the next week or so.

Officials are also concerned about possible opposition from people who object to the visual impact of the 200 foot tall towers atop their mountain. But the same officials discounted the potential for opposition stating that, “I think that five years ago you wouldn’t have been able to suggest this project. But I think today people understand the scale of climate change”, according to Jim Stark, winter recreation supervisor for the White River National Forest.

This is one of the consequences that I predicted when I warned how liberals will continue to promote propaganda and false science to further their agenda. The more people hear the flawed arguments, the more they begin to accept them, and allow costly attempts at mitigation of the purported problem. It is a slippery slope we are on as liberals begin to get their agendas accepted with incremental advances. It doesn’t matter how outlandish the claim, if they repeat it enough times, they begin to garner favor.

Don’t get me wrong. I am in favor of doing what we can do that is within reason to limit our use of fossil fuels and reduce our impact on the earth. But each and every attempt at that mitigation comes with a cost. In this case, we may have to loose a few hundred bats and we’ll have to put up with the visual of the towers on top of a picturesque mountain in Colorado. Environmentalists used to complain about electrical transmission towers, poles and lines calling them visual polution. How is a spinning wind turbine not visual pollution?

What is more, if three turbines will eliminate two-thirds of their electrical energy use, why stop there? Why not put in five, or ten towers? Once you have a few unsightly towers up there, people will get used to them and won’t mind a bunch more. I mean you should see our desert around the Palm Springs area in Southern California. There are so many wind mills that you can hardly see the desert any more. It’s just incredible.

Get more information on Global Warming at GlobalWarmingFactFinder.com

I can’t believe we let Al Gore lecture us on science. I mean after all, what is Al Gore? He’s a Politician, not a scientist. Moreover, he’s is not just a politician, he is a liberal politician - a very liberal politician.

What are liberal politicians interested in? Liberal politicians are only interested in power and taxation. They crave power more than anything. Once in power they attempt to enhance their power by legislating taxes and laws that further restrict your freedoms, tell you how to run your life, and try to totally control your life through government. The more they control your life through government and taxation, the more power they derive in the process.

I remember years ago, after reading a book that I fell for hook line and sinker, talking to an elder, wiser friend of mine who asked me a question that made me think. He asked, “If you were writing a book that you want to seem believable, wouldn’t you put forth the most compelling arguments you could find to get the largest number of people to buy the book?” He further went on to say that, “Even if your claims may seem outlandish, sometimes the more outlandish they are, the more compelling they are, the more people will buy the book, the more money you will make”.

This follows another axiom I have come to embrace and that is that when you want to find the underlying motivation for anything, ‘Follow The Money’. In other words, who stands to make money from this and How?

Which brings us back to Al Bore and his Inconvenient Farce? To begin with how did he get the researchers and scientists to corroborate his claims? They received money for their time. Further, if their claims become more popular to the point that legislation is created to research the claims, they stand to get more money in the form of grants and research money. Millions of dollars are being doled out from the government coffers to research this whole issue of supposed anthropogenic climate change. And if you are a scientist or researcher on the other side of the of the issue and in disagreement with the idea that man is the evil cause of rising temperatures, how much of that money do you think you will get?

So it pays to be on the right side (or in this case “left side”) of the global warming issue. The more you claim you have evidence proves man made climate change, the more money you stand to get from the government to do further research and propagate your ideas.

About the only facts that were even close to the truth in Al Gore propaganda movie were that we have experienced a slight upturn in global temperature since the 1970’s. Prior to that, temperatures had been going down for 30 years. We have only recently gotten back to the temperatures of the 1940’s. See Whatever Happened to Global Cooling of the 70s.  Also, polar ice caps and glacial ice do seem to be retreating. But this is something that has been going on for years before man could have an influence. In fact when you look at a graph of earth temperatures from the 1800’s and compare it to a graph from more modern times, they look nearly identical. This has happened before. See Climate Skeptic.com.

Evidence that was and is readily available, but ignored by the science authorities presented in Al Gore’s movie shows that carbon dioxide is a result of temperature rise that occurs naturally, it is not the cause. It is the rise in temperature that causes the earth to create more carbon dioxide on its own. And as far as man’s contribution to the carbon dioxide goes, it represents less than 1% of the carbon dioxide created each year by earth processes. Carbon Dioxide is actually a good thing. It is a requirement for life to exist on earth. It promotes plant growth, helps farmers realize greater yields in their crops and causes forests to grow faster.

Further, the more recent evidence and research is indicating that Global Warming is currently reversing. Scientists are now saying that they are expecting a period of global cooling. In fact, we have be experiencing cooler temperature on earth since 2002. You can read more on this in our article Is Global Warming Over?

Perhaps what is most important here is that one needs to be very careful before blindly adopting a popular point of view on a concept that is not proven, just because a semi popular politician has a movie that captured a wide audience. Also keep in mind that Al Gore has made millions of dollars from his movie and subsequent Nobel Prize.

This is a man who is one the worst offenders to whole living “Green” concept. His personal electricity usage is one of the highest in his state for a residential property. His home uses more electricity that about 25 normal residences. Further, when he travels, he does so on a Private Jet. Just one trip on this jet that took him across country, spewed as much carbon dioxide (the element now being claimed to be the worst “greenhouse gas”) and ozone pollutants, as average automobile does in one year.

This is a man who in no way practices what he preaches. He spews the talk, but certainly does not ‘walk the walk’. It’s too inconvenient for him so he leaves that for the ‘commons’ like you and me.

If you want to believe that we can reduce the effect of Global Warming by driving smaller cars, driving less, living in a smaller home, using less toilet paper, using no toilet paper, and buying local foods, then by all means, you should do it. I, in many ways, try to do my part by recycling, reusing as much as I can and trying to reduce my electricity use in logical ways. But I refuse to spend more money to do it. Why should I listen to the “Hollywood Elite” (of which Al Gore is now a card carrying member”) who travel the world in limousines and private jets, producing more greenhouse gases then I ever will, who are preaching the evils of living a modern, technologically enhanced life? Why should I listen to politicians who live in huge, energy inefficient homes, fly in private jets, drive in motorcades and in general produce a “carbon footprint” 1000 times larger than mine ever will be? I mean, compare a motorcade to your normal commute to work.

In the immortal words of “The Outlaw Josie Wales”, “Don’t piss down my neck and tell me it’s raining”. Global Warming is a natural earth cycle that will continue long after we are gone. It is ultimately up to us to “Adapt Or Die”. What have they called that in the past? Oh yeah - “Evolution”.

Scientists are now saying that Global Warming is going to stop in the near future if not already. What’s more, these seem to be the same scientists that have predicting the doom gloom forecast of melting ice caps and lowland flooding. You know the same ones that Al Gore was citing in his dire forecast of the future.

Studies of long term changes in sea temperatures are indicating that … read more

On May 19, 2008, the National Press Club in Washington released a petition signed by nearly 32,000 noted American scientists who reject the premise that Global Warming and Climate Change are a man made phenomenon. In addition to rejecting the idea that the global increase in temperature is the fault of mankind; they reject the entire Kyoto accord to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

A letter by Frederick Seitz, Past President, National Academy of Sciences states, “Research data on climate change do not show that human use of hydrocarbons is harmful. To the contrary, there is good evidence that … read more

Reprinted article from The New York Times, July 31, 2008

On Feb. 2, 2007, the United Nations scientific panel studying climate change declared that the evidence of a warming trend is “unequivocal,” and that human activity has “very likely” been the driving force in that change over the last 50 years. The last report by the group, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in 2001, had found that … read more